SANTEE – It took a group from Brevard College of Brevard, N.C., precisely 18 days to paddle the length of the Catawba-Wateree watershed – stopping nightly along the way to set up camp and resume paddling the next morning.

The watershed spans more than 400 miles, beginning on the Catawba River near Linville Gorge, N.C. and ending at the Atlantic Ocean in Charleston.

Two Brevard College faculty members and 11 students on Saturday, May 16, loaded up kayaks and began paddling the watershed as part of the college’s Voice of the Rivers program – a hands-on study about rivers and their importance to society, making for a unique marriage of academics and outdoor exploration.

According to organizers, the purpose of VOR is “to educate the public and raise awareness of activities that threaten rivers; bring attention to organizations and groups poised to address those threats; and foster a sense of stewardship and community activity among the students who participate.”

An array of gray, orange, green and yellow kayaks could be seen on Friday afternoon, May 29, gently gliding on the small ripples of Lake Marion’s waters near the shore at Santee State Park. It was Day 14 of the trip, and for the next several hours, the park served as an overnight camp for VOR adventurers who allowed the river to serve as their teacher.

While setting up camp, several of the students and faculty spoke with The Times and Democrat about their learning experiences along the way.

For Jordan Martin, an English education/Wilderness Leadership student from Waxhaw, N.C., the experience taught her to listen to the “voices of the people around the river and what the river means to them; how much they care about it and depend on it.”

Jenny Baxter, a music education student from Carthage, Tenn., said the VOR program was all about “experiencing the river as a whole and opportunities to meet different people.”

Environmental science student Karen Love of Greenville said VOR gave her a deeper sense of introspection.

Love, who had no previous kayaking experience, said, “I’ve learned that I have the ability to do the things that I thought I couldn’t do ... no matter what people say.”

Jay Wolfe of Spartanburg, a Wilderness Leadership/experiential education student, said the VOR program was unlike any of the previous kayaking he’d experienced.

Wolfe wrote in his journal on Day 11 of the expedition, “I never knew this gem of a river existed!”

It was the team’s first night to camp along the Wateree River, and Wolfe’s previous kayaking ventures didn’t hold water compared to the team’s experiences that night.

“Once we got to our 30-mile marker, we decided to look for a campsite. We are now camped on a sandbar. Here’s why the day isn’t over yet: the water is still rising!” Wolfe wrote, chronicling the next series of events in real time as they occurred.

“It’s (the rising water) been devouring our little sandbar camp all throughout the evening. Soon it will be up to our tents and we’ll have to hike them into the woods where the water won’t go. Most people are asleep, and this is going to be a huge hassle. However, I think it’s kind of exciting. There are worse things that could happen,” Wolfe wrote.

What’s the worst that could happen? Was it the steady rise of the river, increasing an average of six inches every 15 minutes and being forced to pack up everything in the middle of the night and move to higher ground?

At 6 a.m. on Day 12, Wolfe wrote, “Well, the worst has happened.”

Wolfe’s journal describes the crew packing up gear, hiking through poison ivy, struggling through a trench filled with logs and finally climbing a four-foot embankment – all in the middle of the night – just to escape the steadily rising river (which they soon learned was part of the routine schedule of a nearby hydroelectric plant).

At one point, Wolfe finds comfort in writing a bit of comic relief, “I’m not that tired right now, and a tree root is in my back from [a] hastily set up tent, which is why I’m journaling instead of sleeping.”

Wolfe concludes the day’s journal entry, writing, “The scene of all of us wading through the bog below the embankment was like something straight out of Jurassic Park! I think I’m finally feeling tired now, so I’m heading off.”

The group’s stop at Santee State Park was a welcomed reprieve as shower and restroom facilities were on site.

Robert Dye, VOR faculty leader and professor of Wilderness Leadership, said funding for VOR is included in students’ tuition and students representing any major are eligible to participate in the program and receive course credits.

Dye said the group averaged about 25 miles of kayaking each day. VOR participants planned to reach Fort Moultrie on June 2.

For more information about Brevard College’s VOR program, visit www.brevard.edu/vor.

T&D Correspondent Martha Rose Brown can be reached by e-mail at marfawose@aol.com. Discuss this and other stories online at TheTandD.com.

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